Bretagne: Pleneuf-Val-Andre – part 1

The second good rock pooling session in Bretagne was in the little port of Pleneuf-Val-Andre. The rock pools themselves were very similar to those in Erquy. The only interesting find there was a pretty gastropod I had not seen before (a white snail with a dark brown/black shell about 1,5 cm in length). It looks like a Trophon muricatus, although I am not 100% sureRaphitoma purpurea:

The number of Slipper limpet Crepidula fornicata (live and dead) was quite amazing, there were whole banks of them:

The little channel from the port to the sea, a mix of sand and rocks, was more interesting than the actual rock pools:

with a variety of organisms washing up, for instance this large (dead) Common spider crab Maja squinado (European shoe size 45 in the background…):

Cuttlebones were scattered everywhere along the shore and we even found a clump of Common cuttlefish Sepia officinalis eggs:

The eggs were quite big and had a weird texture. I don’t know if these egg clumps can survive hours on the beach at low tide, probably not. It would have been cool to take them to an aquarium to see if they would hatch. It is extremely difficult to keep cuttlefish though, they need live food and large aquariums which usually are still too small still to prevent ‘butt burn’ when they jet backwards into the tank wall and their cuttlebone gets exposed right through the mantle. In the next post I will get to the washed up seaweeds.

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3 thoughts on “Bretagne: Pleneuf-Val-Andre – part 1”

Can I use your photos of Sepia officinalis eggs to show to some children (6 – 10 years old). I am biologist and teacher and I think that it is important the children know diferente animals and their eggs besides chicken. Thank you veru much.